Comments on: Preview and Chat: The Toronto Raptors

By: Washburn

Washburn — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 16:35:25 +0000

38- you are the kind of guy who always thinks the glass is half-empty, don’t you? don’t take it bad, but sincerelly, i don’t agree with most of your thoughts/comments about the Lakers :s

By: Kurt

Kurt — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 19:08:41 +0000

New post on last night’s win up.

By: Reed

Reed — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 19:04:11 +0000

35. Agree. This has been the best stretch of Odom’s career as a Laker. Maybe not as many big scoring games as some other stretches, but the efficiency, passing, rebounding, and defense have been superb. He’s shooting at an absurd clips and really making good decisions about when to assert himself. Having a productive Odom is huge for our playoff hopes.

I think much of the credit should go to Pau, who perfectly complements Odom on offense with his high post passing and scoring. Pau really is one of the better passing big men in the league (and he’s a willing passer, almost to a flaw) and Odom has taken full advantage of it with his off the ball movement.

By: drrayeye

drrayeye — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 18:14:31 +0000

Since Pau Gasol has been a Laker, we haven’t lost, though we ran out of time on a few games. Still, we have some Chicken Littles telling us that the sky is falling.

The Raptors can beat you from the outside, so our defense played them tight. They took it to the basket. They packed the interior, so we shot the lights out from the outside. J. D. (34), that switching jerseys analogy is not too far off.

Against a pretty good team, the Lakers slightly exceeded their average victory margin. It was a so-so game all the way. Maybe some of the fans were expecting Kobe to score 81 again. I guess lots of you were looking for Pau to provide some muscle with his lock down “D.” Even when his ghost wasn’t here, that’s not been how we’ve been beating Toronto.

By: KurkPeterman

KurkPeterman — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 18:10:41 +0000

34 – hilarious

I agree that we didn’t play that great last night, but I think we’ll be OK down the stretch. After this last big roadie, we have mostly home games with easy teams for the rest of the year. We can use this time to build up confidence and continue to learn how to shut down teams in the 3rd quarter.

By: kwame a.

kwame a. — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 17:58:56 +0000

Something positive about our recent play: Lamar Odom. He is doing everyything right, taking smart shots, cutting consistently, defending well, rebounding great. This all bodes well for when Bynum is in the lineup with him and Gasol. Makes me much more confident about him at the 3, especially when he is in rhythm, stepping into his shot.

By: J.D. Hastings

J.D. Hastings — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 17:37:18 +0000

Why were the Raptors wearing Lakers jerseys last night? It confused the hell out of me for how the lakers could be outrebounded by Toronto while allowing an egregious amount of points in the paint, while shooting nothing but threes. Then it occured to me that the teams must have switched jerseys and it was opposite day. It’s the only thing that made sense. There’s no way Rasho Nasterovic was keeping Pau Gasol from scoring at will.

So anyways, this was a terrible loss for the Lakers, though Kobe showed a lot of heart singlehandedly keeping us in the game late. I never realized how much he looked like TJ Ford before…

Seriously though, Reed is absolutely right. We are not playing as well as the media is saying. If we play anywhere near as lazy as we have been, we’ll go 0-4 over the next week. Sink or swim time coming up.

By: Bill Bridges

Bill Bridges — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 16:44:47 +0000

The first link doesn’t seem to have worked… try again.

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/sports/5611886.html

By: Bill Bridges

Bill Bridges — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 16:43:37 +0000

Regarding defense. I’ve watched a few of the Rocket’s recent games and their D reminds me alot of Boston’s, as it should as Tom Thibodeau installed both defenses. Except the Rockets player hustle more than any other team I’ve seen. There is a good article about this in this article.http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/sports/5611886.html

I’d like the Lakers to pick up a bit of this intensity.

Also, for those interested in the $75,000 “anti-gravity” treadmill Bynum is now running on. This link describes the technology (originally from NASA)
http://www.alter-g.com/alterg/bd.aspx

Any of you getting one for your house?

By: Craig W

Craig W — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 15:07:47 +0000

It is interesting reading that the players may have been reading their own press clippings. I have said how I feel the ‘talking heads’ are really rather empty, but I feel the fans (us people) have also been drinking the kool-aid.

We were, correctly, really bummed out when Bynum and Ariza went down because we felt our defense would suffer. Well it has, big time! When we got Gasol we were so overjoyed that we forgot our problem with defense. Well, we became the most efficient offensive team and that somewhat covered it up – just like Phoenix in previous years.

Now we are surprised we are having trouble because the ‘talking heads’ have us rated the favorite to win the title. Whoa there! Nothing has changed. We are who we said we are. Farmar is a small guard and we are beginning to see why Phil doesn’t really like small guards. Kobe roams too much – not new. Gasol is a good help defender, but not much man-to-man (the opposite of Kwame). Lamar has the need to always ‘help out’ and leaves his man at the wrong time. Fisher is too slow to handle quick guards consistently (gee, that is real news).

These are not new things. We have to have 1-2 players who will play their positions and not cheat; and they need to be people who will play close to the basket. If we pick up anybody, they must be able to do this or we should just leave them off the roster.